Five Things: March 30, 2023
"A new economic engine for culture." Five things for March 30, 2023. That's it! That's the excerpt.
Waiting for “Superman” and the Vast Charter School Agenda
The situation is dire, the film warns us. We must act. But what must we do? The message of the film is clear. Public schools are bad, privately managed charter schools are good. Parents clamor to get their children out of the public schools in New York City (despite the claims by Mayor Michael Bloomberg that the city’s schools are better than ever) and into the charters (the mayor also plans to double the number of charters, to help more families escape from the public schools that he controls). If we could fire the bottom 5 to 10 percent of…
History of the Bronx, For Kids
I have very mixed emotions about the Bronx, where I grew up for the first 12 years of my life (1969-1980), and which remains the closest thing I have to a place I consider home, in a cultural sense. Being able to live there again while my kids were still young was very important to me, even though I knew we’d have to move at some point soon after they started school, and the five years we did were a great experience, positive and negative, allowing me simultaneously reconnect and disconnect before taking the inevitable next step of homeownership.
When my son, Isaac, came home with the assignment to put together a family cultural project — Where Are You From? — I wasn’t sure how to approach it from my side of the family, especially in contrast to my wife’s much more specific and rich Cuban heritage. I’m a mutt without a home, the epitome of a melting pot kid (or is that salad bowl?), with connections to many cultures but no firm roots in any.
Focusing on the Bronx was an interesting and enlightening challenge, especially when trying to boil it all down to a 3rd grade level, and by the end, I was left with the same mixed emotions, a combination of pride and disappointment, hope and disdain. I emphasized the positive, of course, but I’d be lying if I denied the bitter taste of the negative wasn’t still on my tongue, things like the new Yankee Stadium, the miserable public school system and the general feeling of it being a second-class citizen in New York City, on par with or sometimes behind Staten Island.
Buyer’s Remorse
Happy Halloween
Originally uploaded by bloomfieldguy
Actually, not at all.
It’s been five months since we bought the house, four months since we moved in, and excepting the unexpected $1,000 expense to fix a leak in the living room ceiling coming from the upstairs bathroom, homeownership in the ‘burbs has been quite the enjoyable experience.
Despite the somewhat disappointed tone of my last post, Bloomfield has been a great choice for us for all of the important reasons: we’re very happy with Watsessing Elementary School; my commute into the City isn’t too bad; and our neighbors on both sides are very cool people.
I worked from home yesterday so I could go to the kids’ Halloween Parade and class parties, and also be done early so I could go door-to-door trick-or-treating with them for the first time. (Me with them; my wife had taken them out last year right after school.) Following the recommendations of several people, we cut through Watsessing Park to hit Glen Ridge where many of the houses were elaborately decorated, and people were taking advantage of the comfortably cool weather by sitting outside to hand out candy and goodies.
East Orange is for…lovers?
Reddog n Neenee, originally uploaded by Nudnik N Da Hood.
According to CNNMoney it is, ranking it at #21 of the 25 places that have the highest percentage of singles, and an over-30 scene. Hoboken is ranked #1 (ugh), while Newark is #20. (Hat tip to the Barista.)
Interestingly, this is the same East Orange that shares Bloomfield’s southwest border and, every step of the way through our homebuying process, was referred to negatively by, well, just about everybody! (Check the Barista’s comment section for a representative selection of bons mots.)
The worst was the security system sales rep (from Brinks, I think) who drove up the day we were moving in and chatted us up while pitching his services.
Breaking Ground
There are 8 million stories in the naked city, plus another 2-3 million, give or take, if you count the transplants who still commute in for work from the surrounding cities and towns in Long Island, Connecticut and, yes, New Jersey.
From Bloomberg to Bloomfield is my story, a native New Yorker on his third go-round living in the Garden State, now as a first-time homeowner in the town of Bloomfield, which is in Essex County, due West of the Lincoln Tunnel and just north of Newark and East Orange, which are effectively the Bronx to Bloomfield’s Mt. Vernon, the former being where I’m from originally, the latter where I lived for most of my high school years.
Goodbye Potter’s Field
Home ownership is a key theme in one of my favorite movies, It’s a Wonderful Life, and as I called our current landlord this morning to officially let them know we won’t be renewing our lease, I couldn’t help but recall the scene where Mr. Martini is moving his family into their new home courtesy of a loan from the old Bailey Bros. Building & Loan Association:
“No more we live like pigs in this Potter’s Field!”
While our apartment is far from a slum, we’ve definitely outgrown it, both physically and psychologically, and more than any other step we’ve taken in the home buying process so far, making that phone call felt like the most concrete affirmation yet that we’re really doing it. There was also a bit of the bittersweet there with the realization that, after a combined 17 years, I will likely never live in the Bronx again.
Of course, It’s A Wonderful Life has an answer for that, too: